Just as European imperial powers employed gunboat diplomacy, China is using sovereign debt to bend other states to its will. As Sri Lanka's handover of the strategic Hambantota port shows, states caught in debt bondage to the new imperial giant risk losing both natural assets and their very sovereignty.

Just as European imperial powers employed gunboat diplomacy, China is using sovereign debt to bend other states to its will. As Sri Lanka's handover of the strategic Hambantota port shows, states caught in debt bondage to the new imperial giant risk losing both natural assets and their very sovereignty.

A Japanese diplomat, who served as Ambassador to Sri Lanka and Maldives in one, said recently that China is not necessarily doing its job effectively in Maldives."Belt and Road Initiave-related projects funded by China have proven to be a double-edged sword. Concerns are mounting in countries like Pakistan that Chinese investment could prove to be a debt-trap similar to Sri Lanka's experience...China is likely to find itself at odds with both the United States and Saudi Arabia...(James M. Darsey, China's step into the maelstrom of the Middle East, EastAsiaForum)."http://www.eastasiaforum.org/2018/02/17/chinas-step-into-the-maelstrom-of-the-middle-east/

As for the Belt and Road Initiative, a Chinese said to a Japanese reporter anonymously, "No one will remember the BRI in ten years." Another said, "The money that China is lending will have turned into piles of non-performing loans." AIIB has not collected much money and the BRI has not done much business yet, already giving rise to local discontent in Central Asia. China is anxious for Japan to join and take part.

Steve Hurst: Yes, the islands of Maldives are just few feet above sea level and it is predicted it will be under water in only few decades. Chances are then, any request to migrate to other Islamic countries and China will be rejected .

So only hope Maldivians have is to seek refugee status in G. Britain because of historic association with H.M rule in the past.

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The Mueller report in America, along with reports of interference in this week’s European Parliament election, has laid bare the lengths to which Russia will go to undermine Western democracies. But whether Westerners have fully awoken to the threat is an open question.

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